The reference is to the Earl of Rochester's Valentinian, altered from Fletcher, which was produced with great applause at the Theatre Royal in 1684.

It is certain that an audience which found no offence in Rochester's Valentinian could ill have taken umbrage at the freedoms of The Lucky Chance.

Some of the thoughts in Rochester's well-known piece seem taken from it.

Shadwell, as it appears from Rochester's Session of the Poets, was a great favourite with Otway, and as they lived, in intimacy together, it might perhaps be the occasion of Dryden's expressing so much contempt for Otway; which his cooler judgment could never have directed him to do.

In the sweetest hour of the twenty-four, after the sun had gone down in simple state, and dew fell cool on the panting plain, I had walked into the orchard, to the giant horse-chestnut, near the sunk fence that separates the Hall grounds from the lonely fields, when there came to me the warning fragrance of Mr. Rochester's cigar.

" I saw a grim smile contract Mr. Rochester's lip.

"I don't believe a word of it," cried Mrs. Bloundel; "and I will stake my life it is one of the Earl of Rochester's tricks.

Some of the crowd were smoking, some laughing, others gathering round a ballad-singer, who was chanting one of Rochester's own licentious ditties; some were buying quack medicines and remedies for the plague, the virtues of which the vendor loudly extolled; while others were paying court to the dames, many of whom were masked.

" A dark shade passed over Rochester's countenance, and a singular and most forbidding expression, which Amabel had once before noticed, took possession of it.

Seeing, however, that he did not offer to move, they opened on either side of him, and were passing swiftly by, when, with infinite dexterity, he caught hold of the bridle of Rochester's steed, and checking him, seized the earl by the leg, and threw him to the ground.

"Fate, indeed, seems to have brought these young persons together," replied Charles, as he listened to Rochester's recital, who took this opportunity of acquainting him with Lord Argentine's dying injunctions, "and it would be a pity to separate them.

At the same time the bugbear of Miss Ingram and of Mr. Rochester's engagement with her is kept up, though it is easy to see that this and all concerning that lady is only a stratagem to try Jane's character and affection upon the most approved Griselda precedent.

For Mr. Rochester's wife is a creature, half fiend, half maniac, whom he had married in a distant part of the world, and whom now, in self-constituted code of morality, he had thought it his right, and even his duty, to supersede by a more agreeable companion.

But Jane, that profound reader of the human heart, and especially of Mr. Rochester's, does neither.

The reader can judge for himself of Boston's "vigorous volume," of Philadelphia's "delightful treat," of Rochester's "chivalrous and genuine Amercan feeling," of The Christian Advocate's "retort courteous," and of New Orleans' "aggregate outburst of the great American heart," &c.

[Footnote 51: 'Calisto:' a Masque, written by Crowne, Dryden's rival and Rochester's protégé; this Epilogue was through Rochester's influence rejected.]

But in the admission of this claim to the more regular payment of his pension, was comprehended all Rochester's title to Dryden's gratitude.

After Rochester's cry, "'Jane, my little darling ...

And it was thisJane's behaviour in the orchard, and not Rochester's behaviour in the pastthat opened the door to the "imps of evil meaning, polluting and defiling the domestic hearth.

She had also read Moore's Life of Byron, and really there is nothing in Rochester's confessions that Byron and a little Balzac would not account for.

Indeed, it was the manner of Rochester's confession that gave away the secret of Currer Bell's sex; her handling of it is so inadequate and perfunctory.

Mr. Malham-Dembleby, in a third parallel column, uses the same phrases to describe Jane Eyre's arrival at Rochester's house, her dreams, and the appearance of Rochester's mad wife at her bedside; his contention being that the two scenes are written by the same hand.

Beast in view, a study of the Earl of Rochester's poetry.

Beast in view, a study of the Earl of Rochester's poetry.

[Footnote 1: Rochester's 'Allusion to the 10th Satire of the 1st Book of Horace.']